John Gardiner sues Benjamin Cross, a slave owner, for assault and battery. Gardiner accuses Benjamin Cross and his two minor sons, Richard and Benjamin, of committing "a grievous, dangerous, disgraceful, and insulting attack and assault and battery upon" him. Gardiner informs the court that Cross attacked him after accusing him of "having written papers without authority for his negroes, & with the intention of causing them to run away." The first occasion was about 1 March 1842 when Cross and his sons attacked Gardiner at the Cross plantation with a bowie knife and a double-barreled gun. They tied his "hands, feet, & body" with a rope, then "struck him several times in the face, and on the body," and with "the lashe of a negro whip." Gardiner also complains of a second attack. While he was in the custody of the sheriff, Cross attacked him in a billiard room, striking him with a "blackjack-vine" ten or twelve times. Gardiner asserts that both his reputation and his body have been harmed by these assaults; therefore, he prays for $1,000 in damages for slander upon his reputation and $4,000 for physical damages.
Result: Granted; appealed; upheld.
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Repository: University of New Orleans
